


Coming Back Around

by liptonrm



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Castiel/Dean Winchester UST, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Happy Ending, Human Castiel, M/M, Post-Season/Series 05 AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-24
Updated: 2017-04-02
Packaged: 2018-03-08 21:26:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3224036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liptonrm/pseuds/liptonrm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One day Cas walked away. Now he's back and Dean doesn't know what to do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is my version of Dean and Cas's happy ending. Because they deserve one.

Dean woke to the pale light before dawn. His back ached, battered by lumps in the cheap, thin mattress and the desert's cold, early-winter nights. That was it, he had to bang that old furnace back into shape today. He couldn't take another cold night.

His shoulders popped as he stretched, pain and relief in the same moment. His knees creaked when he levered himself out of bed. He never thought he'd live long enough to get so old.

Breakfast was a half-burnt piece of toast with a couple of still-runny eggs, cooked on the cranky electric stove. He sipped his coffee, tepid and gritty with half-dissolved crystals, and stared at his phone. He hadn't spoken to Sam in weeks.

He closed his eyes and breathed deep, letting the scents of dry wood and dryer dust center him, an old trick learned when his dad left him alone on the hunt. He had work to do.

~~~

Something was harassing Mrs. Matthews' chickens. Two were gone already, only blood and feathers left behind, and the old lady didn't know what she'd do if she lost anymore. Her monthly checks from the government only stretched so far.

So Dean spent the morning crawling around with hammer and nails, boards and a spool of chicken wire. He'd turn this coop into some kind of chicken Fort Knox, foxes and coyotes be damned.

A trickle of sweat ran down his back, exertion and the sun warming him even though he'd already thrown his jacket over a nearby post. He stood and wiped at the back of his neck. Mountains cut the horizon, red and sharp in the distance. It felt good to work, to be outside fixing something that was broken. Sometimes, when it was late and he couldn't sleep, when his mind spun itself in the darkness, he wished he'd been born to fix things instead of to kill.

Mrs. Matthews had a jug of water waiting for him at the house when he was done. He picked it up and sucked it down in a few large gulps, the water cool on his dry throat.

“My chickens safe?” she asked, eyes narrowed in the kind of assessing looks Dean liked best. His favorite kind of people were the ones who could call him on his own bullshit.

“Yes ma'am,” he said, setting the jug down and wiping at his mouth. “If anything else gets through there you let me know. I'll come back out and take care of it.”

She nodded and then pursed her lips. She looked down at her hands, joints swollen. “A few years back I would've taken care of it myself.” She shook her head with a rueful smile. “Just not as young as I used to be.”

Dean grinned at her. “You and me both.” He could see her, sitting out there in the dark, shotgun in her lap. He felt sorry for the coyotes.

Mrs. Matthews snorted, a quick scoffing noise. “You don't know what old means yet, boy.” She jerked her head toward the house. “Come on, I've got some lunch sitting on the stove.”

She'd been the first person he'd met when he'd ended up here, still jittery from the city and scraped raw from leaving Sam behind. He'd seen her on the side of the road, cursing a blue streak at a car that wouldn't start. He'd gotten it going and she'd paid him back with beer and conversation, no questions asked. Her kitchen with its cracked linoleum and mismatched chairs was the most comfortable place he'd been in in a long time.

“Awesome,” he said. “I'm starving,” and followed her inside.

~~~

He called Sam that night after dinner, his plate drying by the sink, the rest of Ms. Matthews' casserole stowed in the fridge. The springs in the old easy chair, a leftover from the former resident, squeaked as Dean settled in. The room was dark, lit only by the lamp in the far corner. Night came too quickly this time of year.

“Dean.” Sam's voice came through strong and clear. If Dean closed his eyes he could pretend they were in the same room. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah dude, I'm fine.” Dean grinned a little, something easing in his chest.

Sam sighed loud. “It's been a long time. It's good to hear your voice, man.”

“Yeah, sorry about that.” A bolt of guilt cut through Dean's chest. He hated making Sammy worry. “So how's it going?” He asked before Sam could start the interrogation.

There was silence for a moment and Dean could hear the cogs in Sam's brain turning, the battle between pestering Dean, little brother-style, or letting him have his space.

“School's the worst, you have no idea,” Sam finally said and Dean had to laugh at that, at Sam's pissy little undertone that made him sound a decade younger, like all of the bullshit had happened since then had only been some kind of fucked-up dream.

He let Sam ramble on for a while, telling stories about people he didn't know and things he'd never do. He even had a few anecdotes of his own to add, the llorona he'd iced a couple weeks back and the lost tourist whose flat tire he'd changed.

He forgot, during the quiet times in between, how good it felt to talk to his brother.

“Hey,” Dean said as the conversation wound down. “tell Luisa she's still too good for you.”

“I will, asshole.” Sam laughed. “You take care of yourself, okay”

“I will, Sammy. I promise.”

Dean stared down at the dark phone in his hand. It had hurt leaving Sam behind. But the pain was still better than staying there with him, the third wheel in that small house, the heavy weight of watching the world moving on and not knowing how to move with it. He might still be standing still but at least out here he didn't have to watch everyone spin away without him.

~~~

Dean spent the next morning banging on the furnace. He went over the motor with a fine-toothed comb, checking connections and making sure everything was well-oiled. The last owner had let things go to shit, parts burned out from lack of care. Dean didn't understand people, a couple minutes of maintenance would've saved the whole damn thing.

By the time Dean's stomach reminded him that he could really go for some food, he had a pile of fucked up parts lying beside him on the floor. He might have to go into town today after all.

His mind wandered as he walked toward the kitchen, thinking about motors and maintenance, about where he could get the right parts, or at least the ones that would work in a pinch. He wiped his hands on an old rag and didn't realize that he was humming as he walked, happy with a problem to solve.

The floor creaked in the kitchen and he stiffened, hand going to the wrench hanging from his belt. He stepped through the door and froze. Cas stood there, barefoot, in Dean's kitchen, a beer dangling from his fingers.

“Hello Dean,” he said as if they'd just seen each other, as if he'd never left. “Your fridge is empty.”

“You-” Dean's throat closed, too many words welling up to choke him. He'd given up hoping, given up believing that he'd ever see Cas again. “You're here.”

Cas looked at him, eyes open and clear, and smiled.


	2. Chapter 2

Cas walked away on a bright, sunny day. It was almost a year to the day since the Apocalypse that wasn't, since Sam jumped in a pit to Hell and Cas was blown away right in front of him. It was all still vivid in Dean's mind, the images would never fade: Cas returned to him, human for good and oh so vulnerable, Sam knocking on a motel door, alive and whole in a way he hadn't been in such a long time. Dean had never learned what brought them back to him, he hadn't needed to know. They were all together and that was more than Dean could have ever hoped for.

They had a year together, Cas learning how to be human, Sam healing, and Dean, well, Dean was just glad to have them, to have his family with him. He didn't need anything else.

And then Cas walked away.

They'd just gotten off of a hunt, some nasty monster put down for good. They had beers, the car, and a long highway stretched out in front of them. They had Sam's full-body laugh and Cas's small, pleased smiles. They had each other.

When Dean closed his eyes he could still see the way Cas's face turned solemn, the determined set of his shoulders. He could feel Cas's hand heavy on his shoulder, grip fierce. He had understood Cas's need to go, to discover who he was without all of the noise, without that Winchester baggage that soaked up all the energy in a room. Yeah, Dean had understood but he hadn't liked it, the breath knocked out of his lungs, a hard clench around his heart.

He hadn't liked it but he'd let Cas go, a rictus of a smile stretched across his face. He'd only ever wanted Cas to be happy.

He and Sam had driven off not long after, toward the horizon and the setting sun. They hadn't talked about Cas a lot, there wasn't much to say. There were texts at first, random pictures and disjointed thoughts; a few calls, a few postcards, but they had tapered off. To be fair, Dean hadn't tried too hard to keep in contact, he didn't want to cling, to hold Cas back from the life he really wanted. He could give Cas his fresh start, his freedom.

Cas leaving had been only the beginning of the changes. Sam moved on, too, found a life of his own and someone new to share it with. Dean couldn't begrudge any of them their happiness. His problems were his own. He knew himself well enough to know that there were things in his life, in him, that needed to be fixed but he'd be damned if he knew how to fix them.

He'd run away to the desert, to his new start, as he'd sold it to Sammy. He'd buried himself as deep as he could and somehow Cas had still found him. The bastard stood in his kitchen, drinking his beer, as if a day, a second hadn't gone by since he'd left. There were new new lines radiating from his eyes, a new scar on his chin, but he was still Cas.

Dean would know him anywhere. He would know him in Hell.

~~~

They drove into town in silence. Dean let Cas drive, agreeing to ride shotgun in his broken-down behemoth of a truck. Cas had raised an eyebrow and Dean had followed, stunned and silent. He felt like he was riding through a dream, the world fuzzy and unreal, the only solid point Cas behind the wheel, more relaxed, more human than Dean had ever known. It had to be a dream.

“Where have you been?” Dean asked, gruff voice shattering the vacuum. So many questions buzzed through his head, things he couldn't put into words.

Cas glanced at him and grinned, shocking and human. “Everywhere,” he said. A moment passed and Cas cut a quick look out of the corner of his eyes, like he was expecting a response that wasn't coming, as if he expected Dean to be someone else. He looked back at the road and frowned, silence thick.

“Where is Sam?” Cas asked after a long beat. A bolt of gratitude flashed through Dean. Cas hadn't only abandoned him.

Dean shrugged. “Albuquerque.” He didn't elaborate, even when that scrunched up grimace pulled down Cas's mouth. Dean didn't owe Cas shit, especially not an explanation.

Cas's fingers tapped againts the steering wheel as Dean stared out the window at scrub and dust. Cas grunted and flicked on the radio, Aretha Franklin belting out of the speakers demanding some R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

Damn straight. Aretha always told it like it was.

Cas had been so many things to Dean since he'd walked into that barn and changed Dean's world. But it was only as the world was ending when they began to learn how to be friends, to rely on each other, to care. Now they sat, speeding down a dusty road, and they were practically strangers with nothing to say.

A heavy weight pressed into Dean's chest. This was what they had come to. Two people who used to be know each other.

The track changed, motown switching to something heavy and hard. Dean let the electronic bass beat pound into his head, chasing all of his thoughts away. They only had a little further to go.

~~~

Things got a little easier as they went through town. They had goals, tasks to focus on. It was kind of amazing how the little minutiae of life could build bridges. Groceries were bought, hardware was purchased, and things kind of smoothed themselves over. Dean felt that he reached an almost zen place as he poked through the tomatoes in the produce department; either Cas would stay or he wouldn't and Dean would just handle things as they came.

Dinner went just as smoothly. Not a lot was said beyond the necessary--chop this, clean that, watch that the pot doesn't boil over--but the silence was less strained. Dean wasn't stupid, he knew that Cas was biding his time, waiting for his moment to say whatever the hell it was that brought him all that way after all those years. Dean could wait him out.

Winter nights came early and Dean usually went to bed with them. There wasn't much to do after dark when a hunt didn't consume him. The reception on his TV was crap and he was too cheap, too stuck in old patterns, to have hooked up some fancy service. He had a stack of books by his bed, gleaned from library sales and used bookstores, that kept him company until sleep came. After a lifetime spent in other people's pockets, surrounded by the noises of strangers in motels, he found that he liked the quiet. The emptiness suited him.

He wouldn't change his habits just because he had a visitor. After dinner he set up the old cot he'd found wedged in the back room. It was dusty but Cas would have to deal. He figured anything was better than sleeping on the floor, or the cab of the truck. Dean had one chair and a lamp in the front room, he wasn't exactly running a hotel. But Cas seemed grateful enough, pulling a sleeping bag out of the hodge podge in the truck's covered bed, and settling right in.

“Sleep tight,” Dean said, voice gruff. The old discomfort started to creep back up his throat. He gave it a fifty-fifty chance that Cas would be gone in the morning, flitting out of his life the way he'd flitted back in.

Cas looked up from his tablet and nodded. “You too,” he said, face and voice serious, as if it was a vital message, as if Dean's sleep was of absolute importance. It wasn't quite the “angel with a mission” face Dean remembered, but it was close.

“Okay,” Dean said, because there wasn't anything else to say, and turned away. He could feel Cas's eyes watching him as he left the room.

He settled into bed, old mattress springs groaning as he turned and fidgeted. He grabbed a book off the floor, some old Star Trek novel he'd read a hundred times, something easy, something he didn't have to think about. But even that was too much effort. All he could do was stare at the page, re-read the same paragraph again and again. Kirk had been cloned and shenanigans ensued but Dean could only focus on the noises echoing through the house. He heard Cas shift on the cot, heard the run of water and the flush of the toilet. But the door didn't open, the truck didn't start. Cas didn't leave. Not yet.

Dean threw his book on the floor and shut off his light. A cold wind rattled his window. He let the dark and the emptiness pull him in, let his own exhaustion pull him down toward sleep. He didn't want to think about the morning.

~~~

He dreamed. In his dream Dean flew and it wasn't terrifying, it was joyful. He soared over the world, saw the trees and the dirt and the people underneath. The sun shone on his face and a warm wind whipped around him. He loved it. He'd never felt so free.

He blinked and the world was dark and he was falling. He fell down, down into the heart of a dark forest. His heart raced and he was running, chased by things he couldn't see. He could hear them panting and grunting behind him. If he stopped, if he slowed down even a little, they would get him and he'd be gone.

He struggled through the undergrowth, his feet pulled out from under him by vines he couldn't see. He yelled as the beasts approached, eyes bright. Hot, fetid breath blew across his face as he struggled, wrapped up, surrounded.

He yelled for help, shouted himself hoarse, but the beasts got closer. The largest one leaped at him and he screamed.

He woke with a start, heart racing, blood pounding in his ears. “It’s okay,” a voice hummed, dark and deep. A hand, warm and familiar, rested on his shoulder.

Dean breathed deep and let his heart beat slow. A dream, it was only a dream. The hand on his shoulder squeezed once, and then again, simple animal comfort.

Slowly his eyes blinked shut, warmth sinking into his bones. He slid back down into a deep, dreamless sleep. Soon, everything was forgotten.


	3. Chapter 3

The next morning Dean was up with the sun. He shot out of sleep, grumbling at the brightness, the cold, life in general. He couldn’t sleep late anymore, body too primed to get up, get going, get the job done. His feet hit the concrete floor and he swore. He’d gotten used to the hot, dry desert days but he was always surprised by the dark, cold desert nights. One of these days, he was sure, his feet were gonna freeze and fall off before he’d even taken his first morning step.

He lurched to the kitchen, wrapped in a faded, soft hoodie with thick wool socks pulled on over his feet. He needed coffee, he needed to get warm, he needed to not be awake.

He watched the coffee burble in the pot and let himself zone out. Casual thoughts floated to the surface, brain sliding from the half-life of dreams to something approaching awake-- _He needed to get started on that shed, he had an afternoon of drywalling later that week, he still had to get parts for that damn furnace, he’d need more food if Cas was sticking around for more than a day, oh shit Cas, shit, he had to see if, fuck--_

Dean spun around, shocked adrenaline clearing his thoughts. And there Cas was, leaning against the doorway, eyes half-closed. He was in a hodge-podge of clothes, ratty old sneakers, bright, chaotic, comic book pyjama pants, a faded, worn thin t-shirt celebrating the Class of ‘97, all topped off with the kind of thick, mud brown cardigan that men wore in old movies. It suited him, better than Dean’s old cast-offs had.

Dean hadn’t expected him to still be there, half-convinced that it’d all been a dream. But there he was, in the living and oh so human flesh.

“It’s cold,” Cas grumbled, voice rough and deep with sleep. His voice sounded like it used to, back when he was all electricity and fire and burning vengeance of the Lord. After humanity stuck to him like a parasite, Dean had noticed the change, the slow softening, but the angel was always there, simmering under the surface.

“Yeah,” Dean grunted, his own voice still rough from sleep. He turned back around, his brain still too foggy to handle Cas’s presence in his kitchen, Cas’s continued presence in his life, and let habit and routine guide him through. He rummaged for mugs in the cupboard. He was ready to let Cas use the one he had, that he’d lifted from some diner, like most of the dishes littering the shelf, but he spied one he’d forgotten about, shoved on a high shelf, a gift from a little girl with big eyes and a bigger heart. He pulled it down in all of its pink, princess-y glory. There was a first time for everything, he supposed.

They ate hard toast and drank black, bitter coffee at the sloping table, crunches and slurps and quiet grunts their only communication. It was too early to think about all of the reasons why Cas might have stayed.

The sun had tipped a ways across the horizon by the time Dean had all of the gear stowed in his truck. It was dusty and a little dinged up and it had rolled off the factory line sometime in the mid-80’s, but it got him from point A to point B and that was what he needed.

Cas stared at him across the truck-bed when Dean looked up. His eyes were in shadow, the sun shining behind him. Dean could feel his judgment heavy across his shoulders. He rolled them, trying to force the weight away. Whatever Cas was thinking, it wasn’t Dean’s problem.

Cas hoisted himself into the cab before Dean had turned the key. He shut the door with a creak and a bang and then carefully, deliberately, pulled the seatbelt over and across himself, fastening it with a click. Dean watched him do it, for some reason he couldn’t tear his eyes away, the glint of silver from the buckle, the long sweep of fingers, the fall of wild hair over his forehead.

Cas looked up and met Dean’s eyes. They held each other, eyes locked, stares level. There had been a time when, with a hard stare, Dean knew what Cas was thinking, could challenge him, enlighten him, tease him, or tell him to fuck off, could read him like a book, or at least he thought he could. Like in most things, Cas had proven him for the chump he actually was. 

“Where’s the Impala?” Cas asked, head cocked to the side, like Dean was a puzzle he was trying to figure out.

Dean shrugged and looked away. He turned the key in the ignition, the truck’s engine groaning to life. “It’s in the garage.” He jerked his head toward the structure a few yards away before shifting into reverse and pulling out onto the pitted road.

He’d driven her in there himself before she could get damaged, before the dirt and stones could ding her up and wear her out. She was safe in there, in the dark, covered by a dusty tarp. She’d been through enough.

He could feel Cas’s eyes on him as gravel skittered under the wheels. He didn’t turn, kept his eyes on the road ahead of him. Finally, the seat creaked and Cas looked away. 

Dean didn’t owe him anything.

~~~

Days passed, hell, a couple weeks passed, and Cas stuck around. They fell into a routine, got comfortable around each other again. Mornings were hot coffee and food at the table. Cream of Wheat and local honey found their way to the shelves and there was always a carton of whole milk in the fridge. One morning, out of the blue, Dean woke to the smell of bacon and Cas flipping pancakes on the electric range. Somewhere along the way, Cas had learned how to cook.

Then, fed and watered, they’d head off to whatever job there was to do that day. Because work was work and Dean was used to picking up odd-jobs, throwing a little cash in the kitty, before heading on to the next destination. It seemed that, this time around, he had stayed long enough in one place to get stuck.

He’d never planned to live in Bumfuck, New Mexico (population: more than 3), he’d just kind of ended up there. He’d rolled into town with no direction in mind, looking for a bite to eat, a place to snatch some sleep and something hard and wet to hold him under. He’d been ping-ponging from place to place, sometimes for a job, sometimes on a lark, sometimes because the road just took him there. There had been something restless and scratching inside of his chest, a need to move, to run, to find something, anything, that would help him make sense of the world he’d ended up in.

He’d had a purpose, once upon a time, something that dragged him out of bed and pushed him through the day (and the nights, the long, dark, bloody nights). But that was all gone. Sammy didn’t need him, Cas didn’t need him, no one needed him, not really. And, if he was honest with himself, even the job didn’t carry the same kind of weight that it used to. Things were quieter, anyway, things not bumping too loudly in the night. There just wasn’t enough to do. He had too much time on his hands, too many memories bouncing around his skull, too many old wounds that creaked and cracked and informed him that old age might actually come for him.

Going out in a blaze of glory wasn’t really an option anymore.

So there he’d been, worn down and worn through, when he’d washed into town. And then he’d helped Laureen clear a nest of pixies out of the shed behind the motel ( _“These ain’t the weirdest things I’ve seen by a long stretch,” she’d said of of his surprise at her easygoing practicality. “You should see some of the things I’ve found under some of these beds.”_ ), and then there’d been the roofing job on the town library, and then helping old Joe Compton out after a windstorm had blown a billboard through the plate glass window on his grocery store, and then another job, and then another, until he’d found himself rolling out of a bed he’d inherited in a house he may be able to call his own going through the steps of something that could almost be called a life.

Sam asked him, a lot, if he was happy. He always replied yes, even though he knew Sammy didn’t believe him. He wasn’t quite sure if he knew what happy was, but he’d certainly felt a hell of a lot worse.

And then Cas showed up. Now there were bright days working out under the sun, Cas’s eyes intent under the brim of a beat-up Chicago Cubs baseball hat, Cas’s head thrown back, laughing at some joke that one of the guys made as they knocked down drywall at some reno site, the easy way Cas flipped burgers, long fingers wrapped casually around the spatula, as Dean unclogged the big sink in the truck stop’s kitchen. Cas talked to everybody, or rather, everybody talked to Cas. Mouths just opened up around him and he listened, intent, to everything they had to say. They had liked Dean well enough, had trusted him to get the job done, found out he was reliable and handy, but they were drawn to Cas, opened up to him, lit up around him. People took to him like they couldn’t get enough.

Dean got that. He knew there were things he needed to say, a couple or so issues he should get off his chest. But the longer Cas stayed, the less Dean wanted to say them. He tucked the anger and the fear up and stuffed them somewhere behind his sternum. He was used to that kind of weight, had carried one a lot like it for most of his life.

He just wanted Cas to stay.

Nighttime brought cold beer and clear skies. They’d sit outside in rickety old lawn chairs, frayed nylon strings blowing in the dry breeze, and look up at the sweep of the Milky Way overhead. Dean remembered when Cas had seen it for the first time with human eyes, the first time he and Dean and Sammy had been far enough out that the city lights couldn’t hide it away. Tears had slid silently, unnoticed, down the sides of his face. “I didn’t know,” Cas had whispered, the gravel in his voice almost making him sound like an angel again. “That things could still be beautiful.”

The wheel of the night sky never got old. They would talk, too, conversations held soft and low. Or, really, Cas would talk, about this place he’d lived or that person he’d met. He talked about fish markets in Seattle and delis in New York, about a band he’d heard in Detroit and a woman singing on the streets in L.A. He had a hundred stories, a thousand, and if he noticed that Dean didn’t share any of his own, well, at least he didn’t make a big deal out of it.

And then one night they kissed, slow and easy, as they made their way into bed. Dean could never recall who started it, but Dean had turned and there Cas was, close beside him. They leaned together, in each other’s space, like gravity, like they always had, and their lips met, like they never had before.

Cas’s mouth was hot when Dean licked inside it, his hair soft under Dean’s fingers. Cas’s fingers were cold when he rubbed them against the back of Dean’s neck, the shock a counterpoint to the scrape of Cas’s teeth across Dean’s lip. Dean sighed, a soft exhale between their mouths, and then Cas’s lips were on his again, lush, like they had all the time in the world.

They slowly pulled apart but they couldn’t pull away. Their foreheads rested together, hands still wrapped around necks and hips. “Good night, Dean,” Cas finally said, his hand steady and soft when he moved it, when he slid it over Dean’s cheek.

“Good night, Cas,” Dean replied, the words quiet and only for them.

They pulled apart and stepped, one after the other, into the house, towards their separate beds. Dean could still feel Cas against him, the warmth of his body and the weight of his hands. He let that feeling carry him, draw him down into sleep, and that warmth stayed with straight through until morning. 

Things were something like good. And if Dean walked carefully enough, they might stay that way.


	4. Chapter 4

It surprised Dean how many things he’d forgotten, how many things he’d even had the time to notice. 

They were little things--like how Cas was a morning person, up with the sun and more energy than Dean had seen this side of 20. How he used so much cream in his coffee it was hardly beigey-tan but he never added sugar. How he left socks, just socks, laying all over the place, on the floor, on the table, strewn in the bathroom, and a couple memorable times in the freezer. How he drove like he wasn’t paying attention, one lazy hand on the wheel. How he smiled with his eyes and laughed with his whole body. How good it felt to feel him standing right next to his shoulder, warm and solid.

How guilty Dean felt, still, because Cas was human, whole and incomplete. how Dean had dragged him down into the blood and the dirt. How he hadn’t been able to save Cas from the consequences of his own choices.

Cas was one more person that Dean had never been able to save.

The good times, the bad, the mundane and the ridiculous. Dean hadn’t known how much he missed all of it. How much he’d missed Cas.

He hadn’t realized how lonely he’d been until he wasn’t anymore.

“Sounds like things are good,” Sammy said, tinny and distant on the phone.

Dean glanced over at Cas, sitting lotus-style on the cot, eyes closed, headphones on, face limned warm and yellow by the lamp.

“Yeah, I guess they are.”

They didn’t hurry to kiss again, didn’t hurry to do anything. Dean had wrapped his solitude around himself for so long he’d almost forgotten what it meant to not be alone. It was enough to lean into Cas’s solid warmth, to bump shoulders in the kitchen, to let hands linger on shoulders and backs, to feel a heartbeat counterpoint to his as they sat close, side by side, no space between them.

There were mornings when Dean was up first, when he hadn’t really slept. He would sit out on the step and watch the stars dim, the sky go from black to purple to blue, see the horizon glow pink and gold as the sun rose. When the door would creak behind him and Dean would look up to see Cas there, hair still pressed flat on one side and pillow marks on his cheeks. He would sit down next to Dean and pass him a steaming mug of coffee, the heat always a shock.

They would sit there, quiet, and watch the day begin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the only end I think I'll ever have for this fic. My plan for this story was to take a Dean who was rudderless and purposeless, a Dean whose world had changed and who wasn't sure how to change with it, and to take him from there to a place where he could find some version of a happy ending.
> 
> But no matter how hard I bang my head against the keyboard, I can't find the bridge from the Dean here to the one I see in the final scene that already exists in my mind, a Dean who is happy and who is willing to believe that the people he cares about will always care about him, no matter what. The story from here to there is either too big or too small for me to write. I just can't drag it out of my mind or channel it through my fingers. It exists somewhere, I'm sure, just not right here.
> 
> Here's the thing about the kind of depression I've tried to depict here, nothing is big enough to fill it, no other person, or place, or belief, or love, can come from outside and make you whole again. But it can be healed over. It takes time and trust and relearning your own worth over and over again. Its a daily struggle, until suddenly you look at yourself and realize that you do love yourself and that you are worth the trouble, that you're happy.
> 
> it's not easy and it's not perfect, the hole never really goes away, but things do get better. That's what I wanted to depict with this story. And that's what I'm not going to be able to do. Just know that at some point Dean wakes up and he's warm. The sun is shining through the window and he can hear Cas moving around somewhere outside of the room. This is a Dean who smiles, who gets out of bed, who drinks coffee and leans against Cas on the couch. A Dean who gets up eventually and grabs his toolbox and finally, finally finishes fixing the furnace while Cas hands him parts while telling him about a story he'd just read online.
> 
> In another world they were happy. Because that's what they deserve to be.


End file.
